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Brandon Sanderson is one of my favourite authors, so I didn't even bother reading the back of the book before starting this novel. There I was, on the first page, stunned that I was reading an amnesia story. Red flags were going off; this is one of my most hated tropes. Several hours later, I'm here expressing my disbelief that I actually enjoyed an amnesia story. Apparently this is considered the 'White Room' story style: where the narrator has to figure out who they are along with the reader. Keeping the reader in the dark is the critical difference, and what a difference it is!

In order to avoid spoilers, I'll simply expresss how well done the amnesia story element was. It drove character growth in a meaningful capacity while also avoiding irritating resolution mechanisms. All the downsides of the trope were avoided, and the fragments of the titular Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England guidebook was a clever way to introduce worldbuilding to both narrator and reader. The first-person POV was critical in pulling this off. I liked the main character's personality, as a blend of sarcasm and self-deprecation that was both funny and gave us an underdog we could root for.

Perhaps it was the title of the novel that made me assume everything would be tongue-in-cheek, but the accuracy of the historical fiction in this novel surprised me. It's lucky that I had dived into realistic Arthurian legends recently! The Celtic and Anglo-Saxon culture is really well-represented, and I further appreciate the main character calling out that just because he's from the future, doesn't mean the people of the past are dumber. I loved the representation as culture shock; something that's difficult to write because it requires us to recognition things we didn't realize existed.

The story skips a lot of Sanderson traits though: there's no magic system, it's not set in the Cosmere, and it's not even building up a trilogy! Despite all that, this is a tremendously enjoyable one-shot. It's imaginative, unique, realistic yet funny, and defies easy categorization as I tag it as fantasy, science-fiction, and historical fiction all at once.

Highly Recommended.

A terrifying new enemy after centuries of peace and abundance is the setting for Warship, written by an author who looked at the immense expanse of space and asked: why fight? Typically the worldbuilding for a military sci-fi universe doesn't bother with such basic questions, but starting from the premise of near-infinite resources, readers are introduced to a natural, organically built society rich in politics and technological advancements that may arise in five-hundred years. What's truly impressive is this creative, deep worldbuilding comes through in small glimpses and brief interactions, because the plot of Warship is about a spaceship firing its guns in anger.

The overall story is lifted from similar novels in the Age of Sail category. There's an introductory shakedown cruise where you meet the Captain, his officers, and learn what you need to about the technological capabilities of the setting. There's the threats: career bureaucrats, political corruption and whispers of external dangers beyond the horizon. The Captain even embodies a certain archetype that is common in this genre - a skilled, well-meaning individual unlucky by birth and lacking political connections. This is not a groundbreaking novel.

Yet the execution is perfect. These tropes work, and they provide a variety of threats and thrills for readers as the author builds momentum towards some truly epic showdowns. Everyone wants to see the underdog win. After a technically competent but thoroughly mediocre set of introduction chapters, we launch right into the "terrifying new enemy" and I found myself unable to put the book down. Action, brilliance, heroism -- all the elements are here. The setting is excellently developed, the pacing is great, and the threats (foreign and domestic) are frightening, tense, and vile.

Recommended - it's not quite grimdark, but this is exactly the kind of self-serious novel I love.

Authors often rewrite and cut major scenes out of their novels, either to improve pacing or just to respond to feedback of their editors and beta readers. Sometimes, those plotlines are beloved by its creator, but were left on the cutting room floor. Unfortunately, Trouble on Paradise is what happens when an author feels there's a story left to tell and refuses to let go.

This novella, weighing in at 33% the size, continues the adventures of the lesser narrators from Paradise and covers some of the gaps in that story. Skippy and Bishop don't appear in this book. While I never asked the question "What would Expeditionary Force feel like without our comedy duo?", I have the answer:

It's bland. Mediocre.

The author has no one on the bench that has the charisma to lead a story. As implied earlier, the story itself feels like material that wasn't important enough to go into the previous book. The end result is a perfectly functional, well-thought out conclusion to many threads that you never cared to follow. Unless you're an incredible fan of Perkins, or a rabid fan looking anything Expeditionary Force, I'd skip this novella.

Not Recommended unless you are a true fan.

Paradise is an improvement over its predecessor while maintaining its core formula: a lighthearted space adventure driven by the buddy-comedy duo of Skippy and Bishop. While its predecessor felt very episodic, this novel widens its scope to address the social-political impact of humans taking their first steps on the galactic stage.

Craig Alanson takes a further risk and introduces new POVs. This is a welcome change! Bishop's solo narration is joined by a variety of new characters. As a military sci-fi novel, often the solution to most problems involves guns and explosions. Battles were never tense though, as the fate of Skippy and Bishop is never in doubt. New narrators don't have such plot armour and so the novel is tenser and more vivid than its predecessors.

The worldbuilding deepens by returning to familiar territory. Previous time spent explaining the political situation of the Ruhar, Kristang and UNEF on Paradise allows the author to build momentum into some fairly complex plots. It's a suprising trade-off: our cast explores fewer star systems, yet as a reader, the story explores much more alien topics. Instead of constantly introducing new locations that lack emotional buy-in, the author reduces the locations covered by the story and makes the stakes much more real.

Additional narrators also reduces Skippy's screentime. While I think readers (by this point) are all fans of Skippy's special personality, distance makes the heart grow fonder. He's funnier when he's not the focus of every scene, and his competence is all-the-more impressive now that we get a closer look at some of the aliens.

Paradise is one small step for content, one giant leap for the author's writing skill. I look forward to future output by Craig Alanson.

Recommended.

SpecOps is a fun space adventure with a military angle. Defying easy categorization, it's most similar to the Stargate series, where professional infantry explore the universe and slowly help Earth improve its technology against near God-like opposition. Even the tone is the same: lighthearted, full of witty banter, and set in some complex military scenarios.

Despite the comedy duo of our main characters, victories are won through clever rule-bending or extrapolations of known limitations. The author has thought through what technology can and cannot do, and everything is internally consistent. As a reader who demands self-serious novels, this is something I look for in the worldbuilding of advanced technology.

But while the author avoids treating his worldbuilding like a joke, Skippy the AI's comedic presence and caustic personality will decide if you like the Expeditionary Force series. He was the big twist in Columbus Day and, in my humble opinion, the key differentiating factor that distinguishes this series from other SciFi novels. I enjoy the buddy-comedy of Skippy and Bishop, and if you didn't like them in the first novel, the second won't change your mind. Additionally, Skippy's incredible competence robs the novel of tension. I'm not emotionally bought into any of the dangerous situations, and that's unfortunate since the cast is in constant peril.

The sequel is far better paced than its predecessor, with scene after scene of action. It's odd then, that the plot is still missing direction. There's no overarching story, and unlike Columbus Day, the author doesn't reveal any twists that are particularly surprising. So while the writing has improved and this book is better than the former, there's still something missing as you move from chapter to chapter.

SpecOps is an entertaining and funny novel set in a serious scifi universe. Unfortunately, a good laugh is all you'll get. The novel lacks tension, excitement, and even a good villain to hate.

Recommended with reservations.

The Burning White is divisive ending, and a great deal of your enjoyment will be dependent on your relationship with the Christian God. I understand the hate. There are many great critiques that analyze this flaw so I will instead focus in a different direction. I found the novel to be entertaining, but ultimately hollow as I finished the climax and denoument.

The biggest failure with this book is its literal size. It's HUGE. It's two books bundled as one. My expectations grew larger with every page that passed. Unfortunately it tells a simple story using the three-act structure, which means the pacing is incredibly slow. Everything in the first half is inconsequential and repeated four times for all four main characters. All the revelations are in the back half. By keeping all the good stuff to the end, final battles with multi-book villains are short, underdeveloped, and their resolutions feel disappointing. As a reader, I simultaneously feel cheated at the story being insufficient AND frustrated at how long the novel is.

When a book is large, it telegraphs the author's intent to wrap up the series. Therein lies the second failure: insufficient imagination. The Burning White wraps up the most pressing story events, but fails to address themes from the last four novels. The author's story outline was too conservative; more consistent with Act Two than an attempt to wrap up a five novel epic. There was little effort to change the status quo and events unfolded as expected from the end of The Bloody Mirror.

Ultimately, I can't recommend this novel. I was entertained but the investment of time was not worth the result. Even overlooking the Christian elements, I'm left disappointed with the worldbuilding, cheap character arcs, and simplistic resolution to previously complex plotlines. I'm quite sad that this is how it ends.

Not Recommended. Better you never read this and use your imagination as to how it all ends.

Columbus Day is an introduction to the Expeditionary Force sci-fi universe, and it's slow. It's barely science-fiction to start, beginning with present-day first contact with an alien species. We spend time waiting for human society to grow up, recognize its place in the cosmos, and slowly upgrade its technology. To add insult to injury, the sole narrator is an American ground pounder who constantly reminds us of his simple origins and lack of ambition, all the while narrating with an aw-shucks attitude. The charicature of a down-to-earth, non-intellectual everyman is almost comically laughable.

I'm being unfair, but those two points produced a wall that I needed to overcome, without quite knowing what's on the other side. How could this mediocre slog be worth (as of 2023) fourteen additional novels?

And then I got it. Halfway into the novel and the story truly began. The back-half is everything I wanted: a universe to explore and spaceships getting you there, fantastical alien beings and lots of advanced technology. The cast's military background does mean all technology results in pew-pew battles, but like the best books of this subgenre, fighting a war requires you to be solving problems that Alexander the Great would recognize: logistics, tactics, morale etc. It was an incredible ride that pulled no punches, and now I'm ready for the next book.

There's a universe where an editor recognized what's special about Columbus Day, and helped the author cut through the slog that was the first half of this book. We didn't get that universe. Here's my advice: skim, slash and skip through the first-half of this book. There's gold on the other side, and you'll know it when you see it.

Recommended with reservations.

The Blood Mirror had to meet some lofty expectations, as The Broken Eye ended on a combination of climaxes, cliffhangers, and revelations that is the author's signature. Brent Weeks knows how to whip up the fans into a froth, and I tore into the fourth novel expecting sheer brilliance. This is tough to pull off. I want a novel that ramps up slowly, but simultaneously coming off a thrilling conclusion, I want the book to keep going at the blistering pace of a third act.

I think The Blood Mirror is a success there. There are plenty of scenes that are the calm before the storm, but they're still tense and full of energy. And the novel lands some of the biggest surprises of the series so far, and that's really saying something.

My biggest gripe is that Kip is the star instead of Gavin Guile. This confuses even the marketer writing the back of book, who keeps referencing Gavin while never mentioning Kip. I love the fantasy of watching the lowest of the low, through willpower and intellect, grow into one of the greatest warrior-leaders in the world. But I'm absolutely sympathetic to the fan that has given up on this series because the author keeps sidelining Gavin Guile. The Prism steals the show in every single scene he's in.

Recommended with one reservation: if you are truly sick of the author making Gavin a secondary character, this novel will not make you feel any better.

The Midnight Line represents the floor of Lee Child's refined Reacher formula - it's a supremely entertaining read whether it's your first, or twenty-second experience with the series. At the same time, there's nothing in this that excels. It's thoroughly mediocre but comforting... like cold leftover pizza.

All the strengths are here: the core mystery is intriguing, the action rare but rapid and vicious when it occurs, and attention to details shows in every element of the background research as well as the intricate timed plotlines. All the weaknesses are here too: the side characters are forgettable, the conclusion is always too abrupt, and Reacher just has to get-the-girl.

I also intellectually appreciate the effort spent showing all sides of a modern crisis, but there's a degree of delicacy that needs to be exercised when discussing something that is relevant to modern politics. I felt the author ended up on the preachy side of things and it detracted from the story.

Recommended with reservations: this is an entertaining episode of Reacher's life and addresses an important topic. Yet ultimately there's nothing special about the story.

I was so excited by the previous books that I was halfway through The Broken Eye before realizing that it was an inexplicable slog. With over a thousand pages before it, numerous cliffhangers and loose threads to resolve, even without author fiat, the narrators should have had sufficient momentum to carry the plot forward.

Instead, The Broken Eye is a directionless mess. Brent Weeks took the incredible action-packed climax of The Blinding Knife and called a timeout. Everything is put on hold. Gavin and Kip find themselves without agency, removed from events of importance while the world passes them by. Karis is written out of the story, with as many narrative chapters as Aliviana. The war, always the backdrop, barely warrants a mention. The only character who is doing anything of value is Teia.

This is partially due to the ambiguity of our antagonists, something I previously praised. It's a very tense and thrilling novel where you're not quite sure who is the enemy, but when there's no clear villain, we need short-term goals. The Blinding Knife spent much of its page count on Kip's entrance exams into the Blackguard, but no such goal exists in this book. Characters wander from scene to scene like a slice-of-life novel, accomplishing minor tasks without any overarching plan, despite there being an actual war in the background.

Yet somehow I still felt the desire to read just-another-chapter. And credit where credit is due, I love it when authors recognize that defeated foes shouldn't just fade away after a protagonist deals with them. They're given life off-screen and return simmering with resentment. It breathes realism into a world. Events of import continue to occur in the background and secondary characters that disappeared from our narrators viewpoint continue to live their story.

Sadly, their story appears to be more interesting than the one we're reading.

Recommended with reservations - pre-existing goodwill should see you through the first mediocre half, and the last quarter has Brent Weeks returning to his fine form.

Unlike Slow Horses, Dead Lions is a novel that does better than its (enjoyable) TV adaptation. It's also different enough that viewers will also enjoy reading the source material. As events diverged from what I had seen, I started to understand what fans of Mike Herron already know: the Slough House series is an intricately plotted thriller where much of the drama comes from subtle character interactions. There is so much clever detail hidden throughout the story that I suspect a re-read would still have one discovering new surprises. Yet at the same time, the first read is tense as you witness the slow unravelling of a mystery, have your expectations dashed, and watch Jackson Lamb do what he does best.

The TV adaptation takes Dead Lions as inspiration for the second season. While the setup is similar, the back half of the book is different, resulting in a lot of different character motivations and interactions. This alone should be sufficient reason for viewers to pick up the novel. Additionally, the book's conclusion is much more intellectual and complex, and the deviations are the result of inserting eye-rolling Hollywood tropes that not even Gary Oldman's presence can cleanse.

And while Slow Horses might have you thinking this series was about the mystery, Dead Lions revels in its ensemble cast: with Catherine Standish, Roddy Ho, Lousia Guy, Min Harper, and River Cartwright all fighting for page count against the fantastic Jackson Lamb. A few new characters are also introduced, and some old ones revisited, but the focus of the novel is on how the cast interacts and grows. These changes occur subtlely while the plot proceeds with its twists and turns, and while you might be forgiven for focusing all your energies on the Soviet bogeyman, I think the true joy in this novel is watching the cast get back on their feet.

Recommended.

I'm embarassed to say that I prefer the TV adaptation of Slow Horses, and don't think viewers will get anything out of reading the original novel. Typically I expect that the novel is deeper, smarter, and more complex than a TV series. Unfortunately for us readers, the adaptation is very faithful to the source material while suffering the sin of not having Gary Oldman.

The TV series provides many more scenes of Jackson Lamb tearing it up, delivering hilarious verbal abuse that is part of the charm of Slow Horses. The showrunners gave Gary Oldman more material and as a result, the novel feels like it's holding out on us. There's also a sense of effortless gravitas in an actor of his skill, and so while the novel tries to surprise you with Jackson Lamb's hidden talent, viewers instinctively know that underneath the dirty jacket is a man to be reckoned with.

On the other hand, the novel is a bit more intellectually complex. It's shorter and more focused. The adaptation also suffers from watering down its themes with Hollywood-action and requirements to give all major actors/actresses a certain amount of screen time. These are all qualities that do credit to the original source material. Sadly, the downside is to not see Gary Oldman. And that's just not worth it.

Recommended with reservations -- seriously, just go watch the TV series.

The Blinding Knife is the kind of sequel you want in a great series: it takes the foundational elements laid in the first novel and delivers more of what you loved while expanding the world. The politics are appropriately convoluted, our knowledge of drafting appears to be the tip of the magical iceberg, and the religious/historical treatment of wights becomes so morally ambigious that it upends everything you thought you knew. It's also an exceptionally tense novel. The story is long and you end up growing quite attached to the leads, but a sense of dread is pervasive throughout because you know at any moment, things will go terribly wrong. Brent Weeks spends most his storyline torturing his characters and it's rare that anything goes well for them.

That said, this novel isn't so much about Gavin Guile as it is about Kip. The teenager gets the kind of growth that could almost be considered fanservice, as it delivered all my desires while still feeling well-earned. However, the back of the book leads one to believe this novel is solely about the Prism and I suspect that Kip might actually have more page count than Gavin. I'm happy with that, since as Kip learns about the world, so too do we readers. From this perspective, the novel feels more like a first novel rather than the sequel.

Nonetheless, I doubt you would be reading The Blinding Knife if Kip's self-deprecating humour wasn't amusing. And once you're on the third act of this novel, things move at a rapid pace and nothing is safe, least of all your expectations. I love all the antagonists, including the fact that I'm not even sure which are the villains, and watching them execute their plans is a pleasure.

Highly recommended.

Night School is the first Reacher prequel novel that I actually like, where he's in his prime as an MP but events aren't written overtly to bridge the gap to The Killing Floor and the events in Margrave. I've found previous prequels to be hamfisted in those attempts, and the central mystery to be boring compared to modern-day Reacher settings.

Lee Child also delivers everything in the highly refined Reacher formula: the mystery is excellent, the action is rare, but brutally violent when it occurs, and the details are critical and carefully thought through. Reacher has an excellent foil in Neagley, who is the only ex-Special Investigator with a personality that I can recall and isn't the standard Lee Child female character. The weaknesses are also the same... for me, that's the standard cringeworthy Reacher-gets-the-girl plotline, which is completely unnecessary but probably services a certain subset of readers, as well as a conclusion that is far too abrupt for the number of characters introduced in the novel.

What lifts this above the standard Reacher-fare is an antagonist that isn't cartoonishly evil. There's a number of plots-within-plots and all the antagonists feel realistic. Sadly though, I still prefer Reacher when he's avenging small problems, and this is pretty much the opposite. His antics don't feel as unique when he needs to save the world.

Night School is not in the top tier, but is an above-average Reacher novel. Given how many there are, that's saying something.

Recommended.